Overview

This book presents a history of the volitional theory of causation--the philosophical proposal that volition, or will, of the same or broadly the same stamp as that which we experience in our own deliberate and voluntary doings, should be taken as the basis for all causality. Few today know much about the volitional theory of causation, and even fewer have given it any serious attention. But if current opinion regards this suggestion as an unusual one, of minor importance, the historical record shows otherwise, revealing that it is a theory which has been proposed and developed again and again throughout the modern era. Its obscurity is only a recent phenomenon. Starting at the beginning of the Early Modern period and progressing right up the modern times, the historical discussion takes in both supporters and critics, as well as both famous and less well-known figures, to tell the story of a long-running debate which contemporary history of philosophy has forgotten. The principal figures discussed are Berkeley, Hume, Reid, Maine de Biran, Schopenhauer, Mansel, Mill, Martineau, Alexander Campbell Fraser, Borden Parker Bowne, and G.F.Stout, although many other philosophers are also considered. The book ends with a consider of the philosophical merits of the theory.

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9780192867537

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Reviews

The focus is on Anglophone philosophy, especially in the nineteenth century, with Maine de Biran in a key supporting role...The book is also a defense of the volitional theory, taken in a robust and not just analogical sense. * Aaron Wells, Metascience * Learning about the theory enlarges knowledge of causality further even as it also leaves one wondering why the theory has been left unexplored in the philosophy of mind and action theory....Recommended. * Choice *

The focus is on Anglophone philosophy, especially in the nineteenth century, with Maine de Biran in a key supporting role...The book is also a defense of the volitional theory, taken in a robust and not just analogical sense. * Aaron Wells, Metascience *

Author Information

W.J.Mander is Professor of History of Modern Philosophy at Oxford University, where he is a Fellow of Harris Manchester College.

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